Playing with Fire
by GeneFlowers
Summary: Continued after the end of Series 3, tying up loose ends and providing surprises aplenty involving Molly, Evan, Jimbo and of course, Gene and Alex. Inspired by the lyrics of 'Playing with Fire' by Brandon Flowers Please R&R, this story should get good xD
1. Chapter 1

**A/N Hi guys, been planning this story for a long time, so hope you'll like it. In fact, this is pretty much why i first came on to ff. This story inspired by the song 'Playing with Fire' by Brandon Flowers, is basically going to continue from the end of series 3, with lots of surprises and some loose ends tied up. Don't get me wrong, I loved the ending, but it did leave me feeling kind of unsatisfied, and this has been boiling away for a while, so please R&R, it'll mean the world to me. The first chapter is pretty short, but I think its best to get them up (finally.) Enjoy! :) Naha x**

Playing with Fire ~ Chapter 1

Gene sat down heavily after dealing with the new bloke, going on about his "eye-phone" or some such rubbish. He couldn't handle a new person right now; he had too much on his mind. He heaved a sigh and pulled his hip flask out of his jacket pocket, resettling himself on his chair as he looked at the Mercedes brochure that had been left on his desk by...who knew? One of CID, probably. Just to rub in the loss of his poor Quattro. Ah well. This new Merc actually looked pretty good.

This was useless, he couldn't deny it. Throwing the brochure onto the desk like a child having a tantrum, he stood up and walked out of his office, over to the desk that was formerly occupied by DI Alex Drake. Bollyknickers. He missed her, he really did. More than he had missed Sam or Annie when they'd left, more than he missed Shaz, or Chris or Ray. He sat down at her desk, running his hands over the calloused wooden surface without paying it any attention. His hands stopped roving as he felt something, scratched into the surface; he looked at it. 6620.

Whether she had written it, or whether Jim Bastard Keats had inscribed it on her desk for her to find, he didn't know, but it made him think; she knew everything about him. She had been so determined to find out what he was hiding, and yet he knew so little about her life. He knew she had a daughter, but he had never seen her or met her; as far as he knew, neither had Alex since she had been here. Why was that? And how could he know so little about her when she knew so much about him? He didn't even know how she had died, for God's sake!

He remembered once, he had argued with her about her daughter, saying she never saw her or spoke to her; that had struck a nerve-she had whacked him in the face. But that was only a small part of what was confusing him now, even after the truth had been revealed; why didn't Alex make sense? Where was she from, how could she remain such a mystery, even after she'd...even after he'd made her leave. He wondered if that was part of the reason he had made her go; he had thought it was because she needed to go, because she was ready, and he _had _to stay here, on his own, to continue working...but was that really true? He never remembered being told that he had to do this alone, and she hadn't been ready, had she? She hadn't wanted to go, hadn't wanted to leave him; he practically had to force her into the pub...

'Oh bloody hell, Gene, you've really bollocksed it up this time.' I mean, what if she wasn't ready, and he had pushed her somewhere she didn't want to be because he was too scared of the things he didn't know, or understand? 'Let's face it, Gene' he thought to himself, 'It's not her you're afraid of. It's yourself.' He buried his head in his hands. Well, he couldn't undo what he'd done. But he could find out more about her. That, he knew how to do; it was his job, after all. She had to have some evidence of some sort round her desk, or perhaps in her flat. He began rummaging around the debris on top of her desk, but there was nothing personal there; just case evidence and notes. He walked out of CID in a daze, on his own personal mission to search Alex's flat for evidence.


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N Hope you enjoyed Chapter 1. I'm starting to get somewhere now, so enjoy! :)**

Playing with Fire~Chapter 2

Molly plonked herself down on the grass next to the River Thames. She wondered if running away had been a mistake. She had only been away five hours, and already she had been wolf-whistled at by several drunks, stumbled across a circle of stoners and been asked to join them, and nearly been kidnapped by an old pervy bloke wearing a beige mac. "Alright darlin'" he had said, sarcastically, "Are you lost? You want me to give you a 'lift' home, if you know what I mean" he leered, and Molly, her heart beating like a machine gun against a steel door, had run for her life, not being able to hear whether he was following her over the rat-a-tat-tat of her heart in her ears. She had finally flopped down when she had run out of road, and now here she lay, by the river, breathing hard, wondering whether she was safe, and at the same time thinking that she might just have been paranoid, and he hadn't even followed her in the first place.

At 16 years old, with a mum who had been dead for nearly four years, a dad who, if he called once a year on her birthday, she was lucky, and a godfather who she couldn't seem to talk to anymore without getting into an argument, Molly Drake considered herself to be fairly world-wary, and not nearly as naive as many of the girls who went to her posh school were, but all the same, she hadn't been prepared for this; the brutal reality of life as a runaway. As Molly sprawled there, wondering if her life would ever be good again, something just around the bend of the river caught her eye. It was an old boat and, as Molly raised herself up and walked towards it, she saw that her eyesight had not failed her – the faded name on the back read _The Lady Di_ – the boat where her mum had been killed.

Gene returned, empty-handed and grumpy from Alex's flat. It had almost been like she was a ghost, a fading memory of a dream; there had been nothing in her flat to suggest Alex had been there, nothing to suggest that there had been anyone living there at all, except a day old coffee mug with lipstick on. Gene wondered who had cleared the flat out, or whether all of Alex's possessions and obsessions had been taken with her to the next life. As Gene stomped back into CID, Rip van Wanker called out "Guv!" But the Guv in question pointedly ignored him and continued into his office, slamming the door behind him.

As Gene slumped down at his desk once again, furiously disappointed at his failure to find anything useful about his DI, especially for the three years she had been with him. He had taken them for granted, that was his problem; he had taken them all for granted, and now he was stuck with the useless twonks like Rip van Wanker and Bammo and the 'eye-phone' plonker. He sighed heavily, pouring himself yet another drink. As he was draining the glass, something Alex had said came to his mind. It had been a nearly nine months ago, before he had accidentally shot her, and he had returned the letter that she'd given him, unopened. She had told them not to open it until after she was gone, and he had respected that, unlike the others, but she had said "Not even slightly interested in what I have to say to you, Guv?" He had answered flippantly, brushing off her comment, never revealing his true self. He groaned inwardly. He wished he hadn't now.

Then he did a double take. Of course, the letter! That would give him some information about his DI, his colleague, and, despite the fact they always seemed to be at odds, his friend. He exited his office and stood again behind DI Alex Drake's desk, opening drawers, but again, not finding anything. Then he realized that there was a drawer he had missed last time, skipped over because it was locked, but now he was determined to open it.

"Oi, Bammo!" Gene shouted. When Bammo didn't stir from his desk, he took up a pen from Alex's desk and threw it at his head, again shouting "Bammo!"

"What, Guv?" said Bammo, sleepily and more than a little irritably.

"Where do we keep the keys to the desk drawers?"

"What?" he asked, confused at the track his DCI had gone off on.

"Never mind," Gene muttered grumpily, turning into his office again then re-exiting with a paperclip in hand. "If you want something doing..." He fiddled with the paperclip, pushing it into the lock, "you have to do it..." the lock clicked, "yourself!" he finished triumphantly, and a little loudly, earning some odd stares from the rest of CID, which he either didn't notice, or blatantly ignored. He pulled the drawer open, and there, on the top of a pile of papers, was an envelope, addressed in neat, curly handwriting to 'Gene Hunt, DCI'. He pulled it out, shut the drawer, and went into his office once again. Then he shut and locked the door behind him, and pulled the blinds closed, the message to CID clear; DO NOT DISTURB. He settled down to read the letter.

**A/N If any of you have any ideas of what should be in the letter, please leave me a review and I'll try and include your ideas :D**


	3. Chapter 3

**A/N Forgot to put a disclaimer on the previous two chapters, so I'll just do one now. I DON'T own Ashes to Ashes, more's the pity, but if anyone wants to get me in contact with Matthew Graham and Ashley Pharoah, boy would I love to have this turned into an episode :P I can dream can't I? ;)**

**Anyway, R&R if you want, over to Alex! :D**

Alex sat at the bar in The Railway Arms, nursing a glass of red that Nelson had just provided her with; it was her twentieth of the night. She was in a bad way. In the excitement of seeing Sam and Annie again, and the relief of leaving the pain of their old lives behind, the others seemed to have all but forgotten the Guv, but Alex had no such luxury. She couldn't seem to forget him, standing all alone under the stars outside the pub as she fought off her instinct and pushed open the door to the pub, no matter how much wine she consumed.

And that was another thing. She didn't seem to be getting drunk - in fact, she wasn't even slightly tipsy. She wasn't sure if that was her depression, or whether you just couldn't get drunk here, but she knew one thing – if this _was _Heaven, then she certainly hadn't been ready to move on. Actually, she was angry at Gene for assuming she was, just pushing her into the pub when she had only just realised that she was actually dead, and Molly was left without a mother. That he had the audacity to just...just kiss her, then chuck her into the pub like she was some slag who he didn't give a damn about. Why did he have to be so proud, or whatever he was being, and not accept her help, go off alone like some cowboy in one of those dreadful Westerns he seemed to be so fond of...Alex angrily blinked tears out of her eyes; she hadn't even realised she'd been crying. She didn't even know why she was crying. Wasn't this meant to be a happy place? She looked around; everyone else seemed to be smiling and laughing. But it didn't seem fair to be happy, here, when people like Viv, people like Molly, people like Gene, were suffering, alone, in other worlds.

Even the one consolation Alex had in this place was more of a curse. She could watch the living, breathing world on the big TV screen that had apparently found its way into the pub. That meant she could keep an eye on Molly. But it wasn't like there was anything she could do about it if something went wrong, and things seemed to have been going wrong a lot lately in poor Molly's life. She had clearly struggled to come to terms with Alex's death, her school life was suffering, and her home life with Evan was far from perfect. Whenever she was at home, it seemed either Moll y was screaming at Evan, or Evan was yelling at Molly, and that was probably the reason Molly had been threatening to go and live with her father and his girlfriend, which Alex prayed she wouldn't do - if there was one thing that would make Molly's life worse it would be living with Peter Drake and whatever brainless bimbo he had brought home this week. At least, that's what she had thought, until Molly had decided to run away from home.

Alex sighed and dropped her head into her hands. As she was contemplating the irony of Heaven completely sucking, the first piano bars of Drops of Jupiter started playing. This was one of Alex's favourite songs, back in the future, but she was pretty certain it was late '90s, early '00s, so what was it doing on a jukebox in an '80s pub? As she thought this, Nelson seemed to read her mind, and said "The Jukebox here plays songs from every and any age, mon. This is a timeless place."

Alex nodded in realisation and understanding as Pat Monahan's voice caressed the chorus:

"_Tell me, did you sail across the sun?_

_Did you make it to the Milky Way _

_To see the lights all faded_

_And that Heaven is overrated?"_

"Oh yes," Alex said to herself sadly. Then she did what she been trying to stop herself from doing since she came in...she broke down and cried.

Molly made her way along the riverbank and onto the rundown boat. It didn't look as if it had been moved in years. She climbed cautiously aboard, clumsily lifting her legs over onto the deck, ignoring the scratching rust on her hands as she lowered herself down.

Molly did feel a little strange, walking round the boat her mum had been murdered on. In fact, she felt the shivers of several traumatised years and sleepless nights shuddering down her spine like a steam train struggling to set off. Still, she was here now and she might as well look for answers as to why her mum had been killed, if only to get some closure.

She had been kept as far away as possible from the scene of the crime all these years, so when Molly entered into the bowels of the boat, she had no idea she was closing in on the very spot that her mother had been killed. She did, however, know the name of the man that was standing with his back to her. It had been branded into her by countless never-ending nightmares of that terrible day...

"Layton."


	4. Chapter 4

**A/N: Here it is, finally. the chapter with the letter. _So _sorry it's taken so long, but I went on holiday (saw Brandon Flowers, performing Playing with Fire, which this story's based on; it was A-MA-ZING). And then I suffered from severe letter writer's block, and was banned from the computer and...anyway, excuses. But here it is now, I really hope you enjoy it as much as I enjoyed writing it.**

**Disclaimer: I don't own Ashes to Ashes, unfortunately**

**Here is a link to 'Drops of Jupiter' which I used lyrics from in the previous chapter. I recommend listening to it, it's amazing .com/watch?v=KhJA0CRpaJA**

"Layton," repeated Molly. She could have kept quiet and walked away; after all, there was no doubt that this man would have no problem killing her, as he had her mother. But she was sick and tired of just being the lost little girl that needed protecting, and she was sick of feeling completely helpless to the mess her life had become. She wanted to do something, investigate, live on her own terms, even if that meant dying. The dirty, rat-faced man in a long, grey coat turned round to face Molly, smirking behind his big shades as he did so. Molly gulped. For all her internal 'big talk', she had been unprepared to come face to face with the man who had murdered her mum.

"Molly Drake. Long time no see." He stated this in a perfectly ordinary voice, but nevertheless, it was a voice that sent shivers running down Molly's spine.

"What are you up to, Layton?" she asked in her bravest voice, trying to stop herself from shaking. "Why are you back here?"

"Why are _you _here?" he asked suspiciously. Molly glared at him. "Don't look at me like that." He said dangerously. Too late, Molly remembered he didn't like being stared at. "How's your mum, Molly Drake?" he asked, sniggering. That was the last straw for Molly. She launched herself at him, hissing, spitting and scratching like a wildcat backed into a corner, never mind the consequences. However, Arthur Layton, scrawny as he was, was still much stronger than a 16 year old girl. He soon overpowered her, twisting her arm round her back and pulling her head back by her long, dirty blonde hair, then pushing her down to her knees.

"Ow, you're hurting me," Molly complained, but stopped immediately when she heard how futile and childish her words sounded. "This is all your fault!" She yelled. "Everything!"

"Oh, I don't think so," said Layton smugly. "I'm just a monkey, doing the organ-grinder's dirty work."

"Wh-who's the organ-grinder?" Molly choked through the lump in her throat. She was going to die, she knew it, and it was all _her _fault for thinking she was anything other than the stupid little girl everyone treated her as. Layton didn't answer her; he was too busy tying her up. After he had finished, he straightened up and turned around, and Molly almost sighed with relief; he wasn't going to kill her now, just leave her here, Evan would have raised the alarm so in a few hours' time she would be rescued. But it was when Layton bent down to something else; a small electronic box with a digital time reading on it in red, which Layton set to 2 minutes; that Molly realised her relief was to be short lived. "Wh-what's that?" She stuttered, already knowing in her heart what it was.

"Bomb," said Layton shortly, and the lack of expression on his face was scarier to Molly than any leer or evil grin. Molly began to struggle against her bonds, but they were far too tight; there was no give in them. Layton was, unfortunately, a professional. She began to cry and scream out of sheer anger, frustration and fear. Layton didn't take any notice, just turned and stalked out. But before he left the room, he twisted on his heel, to torture Molly one last time, with one word: "Evan." He then walked out without a glance back, just a caustic cackle. These were the last sounds Molly would hear, over and over in her head, until the timer had counted down to zero, then there was a flash of blinding light. Then everything went black.

Gene finished reading the letter, and sat back, in shock. Okay, so obviously he had known that there was a lot he _didn't _know about his D.I., but he had never imagined there was that much. He wasn't even sure he believed half of it. But he had to. Somehow, the events of the past few days had made it impossible to doubt the truth of Alex's letter, whereas if he had read it when she had first given it to him (or, indeed, a few weeks ago) he would have dismissed it as the delirious ramblings of a crazy D.I.

_Dear Gene, _the letter had read

_I'm writing this because I think that, soon, I will finally be able to go home. They've got the bullet out. _Please _don't read this until I've gone. I'm very much expecting all of you to open your letters before, nosy buggers that you are, but please Gene, if you've started reading, stop now. Because, unlike the others, I'm going to tell you everything, and I _don't _want you mocking me for being a mad old bat, or worse, reporting me to D&C or something. _

_Anyway, the truth. Where to begin? Well, I suppose I should start with where I come from. At this point, I imagine you're probably thinking 'Bloody hell, does she come from Mars or something?' in your slightly pathetic, overly sarcastic tones. Well, I don't come from outer space Gene, but in fact, the truth is, in some ways, a lot stranger. I come from 2008. The future. Yes, you read that right. I was a D.I. in 2008, then I got shot (by Arthur Layton, as it happens) and somehow ended up here. Probably because I was working on Sam Tyler's case, so I assimilated his fantasies – that's what I thought when I first came here, at least, although now I'm not so sure. But anyway, I woke up in 1981, on the same boat I was shot on, dressed as a prostitute. And the rest, as they say, is history._

_Or it is for me. All of it. I thought I was here to save my parents, but it turned out this world, or time, or whatever it is, had more in store for me than I could ever have guessed. You remember Caroline and Tim Price? Of course you do, they caused us enough grief last year. They were my parents. I know you probably won't believe me, but think of this – that little girl that you saved, her name was Alex, wasn't it? That was me. You saved me, but I didn't realise, until I saw it the second time, from another perspective, that it was you. _Gene did remember, and what's more, he believed. He remembered telling young Alex "Bye Little Lady. Any problems, you just call the Gene Genie." And, unknowingly (subconsciously, Alex would have said), she had. And he had another memory; holding the little girl Alex, with her crying head buried in his jacket, moving, almost dancing with her as the exploded car burned. And another memory, one that cut Gene right to his core, that stripped him of his Manc Lion tough-guy front, and reduced him to that 19-year-old boy in man's clothing, dancing with a girl...holding her in exactly the same way as he had when she _was _just a girl, her head leaned into his shoulder, face tilting towards his...Gene shook himself out of that painful memory, and turned back to the letter.

_I always thought it was Evan, but it was you. _You _saved me, and for that, I will always be grateful, Guv. Thank you, for looking after me when I thought all hope was lost. And thank you for doing it time and time again, here and now, for being that ever-there presence, for always being stubborn, reckless, bigoted and positively Neanderthal in your attitude and your methods, but for always being _there. _For getting my arse into gear when all I wanted to do was curl up in a ball and die, and _go home_, because I know now, _that _is the only way I will get out of here; by carrying on, by staying strong. _

_I wonder whether I'll see you when I wake up. The others, well, I'm pretty sure that they're just fictitious constructs created by my mind; but you; your presence is so strong, you are on every corner, in every dream- _Gene blushed then, and Gene Hunt never blushed-_you must have some sort of physical presence in my reality. _

_I could bombard you with more truths that are unbelievable, about Peter Drake (that 14 year old boy from a few months back) being the father of my daughter, Molly. I can't wait to see her again, Gene. It's her birthday. She's 12 years old, and she's beautiful. My beautiful girl. Long, dirty blonde hair, deep brown eyes, and a little birthmark on the side of her face that I call her beauty spot. They've got the bullet out, and I will see her again soon, and I need to. I'm starting to forget her face, I've realised, writing this, describing her to you. What kind of terrible mother am I, Gene, forgetting my own daughter's face? _Oh Alex, thought Gene, you weren't a terrible mother. You kept on fighting to get back to her until the very end. He wished he could go back to that past Alex, that 1982 Alex, and tell her...tell her what, he didn't know, but he had behaved appallingly at the time.

"You know, it's just struck me how cold you are, Drake. You say you have a daughter, but you never see her, never try to contact her..." She had slapped him then – he had struck a nerve, and now he knew why. He had tapped into the worries, the doubts the internal battle and hatred in herself. He held his head in his hands. He had deserved that slap. He had deserved more than that. He deserved everything he got now. Bloody hell, Alex, Gene thought. I'm so sorry.

The remainder of the letter simply said,

_I'll never forget you, Guv. Keep being un-bloody-breakable for the both of us._

_Thank you and goodbye,_

_Alex_


End file.
